Day 707: I Have English Teeth

"In England, my teeth are considered rather good", I squeak. I am attempting to look supercilious whilst horizontal on a high-technological dentist's chair. I am not succeeding.

"I will be the judge of THAT", says the dentist. She is a lady; her husband is a cosmetic surgeon. Their eyes met across an escalator on a Toronto underground station; weeks later (O happy chance that brings us randomly together!), they were introduced at a party; a year after that, they were married. They have five children and live what is called a 'lifestyle' lifestyle, involving matching pouffes, spreads in local newspapers and stories about their romance bound in plastic and inserted in a fake Morocco folder in the upholstered waiting room.

When we meet for the first time, she asks me a great many questions, some of them involving the state of my mental health. "Have you ever visited a dentist outside Britain?", she asks. She looks sad when I tell her I have not; it is like telling an oenologist that you have only ever consumed Bulgarian Cabernet Sauvignon.

In the books and on the television that comes from 'across the pond', they talk about English teeth like they are bad. In England, you do not notice them being particularly awful; after all, many of us are equipped with a set of efficient, if slightly off-colour, teeth; more to the point, we are all (in some almost primeval way) dimly aware that if the worst comes to the worst, we can have our rotting stumps removed and replaced with a spanking set of dentures that will, at night, fizz gently in their special glass whilst we dream of treacle tart and trifle.

We are led to believe that the Americans are fools; that their heads are empty, filled only with great glistening slabs, eternally brushed and tended to by multi-millionaire cosmetic dentists, and good for no more than flashing in the Californian sun. It is almost as if good teeth are somehow a mark of vanity; of a life badly led, spent looking at oneself in the mirror and brushing one's hair before going out in public.

The truth is alarming. Canadians (North Americans in a great many ways!) have, on the whole, quite beautiful teeth. Even the ones who say they are frightened of dentists have beautiful teeth; bright without being too bright, set in firm pink gums, perfectly hewn for gnawing on maple taffee and logs and snapping the tops off Molson bottles.

They are quite distracting, these beautiful teeth. They make me want to close my mouth in public. They make me say strange things to colleagues; why, only last week I looked one in the mouth and sobbed: "My God! Your teeth! They are so beautiful!". I have bought yet another electric toothbrush and a water pic, three types of floss, two types of toothpaste and yet another type of mouthwash; in the supermarket I stand, slack-jawed, staring in wonder at the home whitening kits.

But it is no good. I have always brushed and flossed my teeth twice at day, and sometimes three times a day. I do it in the right style, according to all the tooth-brushing experts. But still they insist on being bad. One has fallen out. The other, saved with the glue of a white filling two years ago, has snapped clean in half. According to the Canadian dentist, my teeth are in grave danger of falling out altogether; I am apparently showing symptoms of potential future gum disease. They are rather yellow, apparently; the front one, chipped by my brother in 1975, could be straightened; it is a miracle that my jaw is not misaligned.

"Your teeth are not good", says the dentist. "Every time English people come here I think, surely one will have good teeth! But no, all of you have terrible teeth. Do your dentists actually go to dental school?".

I am released on to the street some time later clutching a free lip balm and a 'dental health plan' that will cost approximately $3.2m to execute. I leave Toronto and come back to Montreal.

That afternoon, I get the number of a Montreal dentist from the woman with the beautiful teeth. Something shifts: that day I notice, for the first time, the cheerful night-time signage of the neon-lit Canadian dentist. In their happy shapes I see the hope of future teeth, smiling brightly and bravely into hopeful morning. It is not too late. No. It is not too late. (What is more, according to the signage, in Montreal the toothbrushes make sex with the toothpaste!!!)